


Necessary Moments

by Venturous



Category: The Sparrow - Mary Doria Russell
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 14:17:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1094917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Venturous/pseuds/Venturous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some lost vignettes from the life of Emilios Sandoz, the 21st Century saint who was the first human to set foot on Rakhat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Necessary Moments

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spiderfire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spiderfire/gifts).



> I never thought I was worthy of writing something for The Sparrow, and I was shocked when I received your assignment.  
> I have drawn on some of the events from the sequel [Children of God](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_God_%28novel%29) in these little sacred moments, that I hope will being you yuletide joy.

_Auditui meo dabis gaudium et laetitiam: et exsultabunt ossa humiliata._

(Thou shalt make me hear of joy and gladness: that the bones which Thou hast broken may rejoice.)

[_Miserere Mei_ (Psalm 51)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psalm_51)

 

 

La Perla, Puerto Rico, May 2004

Running barefoot through the mud and shit, dodging the broken glass with artful instinct, Emilio’s one misstep was to glance over his shoulder to evaluate his pursuer’s proximity. He saw no one, and momentarily swelled with pride just as a claw-like force gripped his shoulder and lifted him, limbs swinging like a mad cat.

“Put me down you son of a whore!”

With a great sigh, the man in black ignored the outburst.

“My son, you know that stealing is a sin.”

The priest studied the boy. Older than he’d guessed from his size, maybe 12 or 13, and deceptively strong, the kid glanced at him with darting black eyes, searching for any advantage or escape route.

The priest continued. “There is, of course, one exception.”

The black eyes stilled, piercing him. A challenge.

“It’s true. In baseball, one who steals a base is a hero.”

The boy looked away and spit, disgusted.

“A child’s game.”

“Oh, no young sir, not a child’s game at all. Grown men play in the great cities of America and are paid handsome sums of money to do so.”

Emilio had seen the baseball cards his peers collected. It never occurred to him those men were real.

“What’s your name, son?”

Emilio usually lied, and surprised himself when he didn’t.

“Well, Emilio, I am Father Yarborough. Would you like to watch a game on TV?”

This was a temptation beyond Emilio’s ability to maintain cynical distance. His face lit up before his mind could muster an indifferent facade.

“I'll take that as a yes. Why not come by the priory after school tomorrow, and we can watch a game?”

Emilio nodded and turned to go.

“Oh, and you can give me that book, and I’ll return it for you.”

Wiping the scowl of defeat from his face before he turned around, Emilio was attempting an angelic and grateful look as he handed over the loot.

He looked at the ground.

“Thank you father.”

“Off with you, and tomorrow, 3:30 sharp!”

D.W. Yarborough looked thoughtfully at the copy of [_Stranger in a Strange Land_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stranger_in_a_Strange_Land) in his hands.

======

 

La Perla, June 2016

“Excellent running today Felipe, just amazing. But we shall need to work on your catching, son. Get with Sergio and practice the long flies and the shorter balls, until we know where you’ll do best on the field.”

Emilio clapped the lad on the shoulder enthusiastically, storing his sigh of great patience for when he was alone.

The boys surged and bounced around him, elated after their game despite their loss to San Carlos. Their coach had convinced them that they were improving in every game, and it was true. Sandoz looked upon his works and it was good. _Beware the sin of pride_ , the priest warned himself, suppressing his smile. He watched as his best pitcher, a former thug named Sergio conferred excitedly with his basemen, while the rest of the boys were preening for the gaggle of girls gathered, giggling, on the shabby bleachers.

There were times like this when something flooded over him, like a shiver, only warmer. He had learned to allow it, this wash of grace.  He accepted it as a blessing. Emilio vowed to write a letter to his mentor and share his gratitude; how one man’s good work on one spring afternoon now touched dozens of dirty La Perla boys.

Good, orderly direction: on a daily basis, that was what Emilio submitted to. In those early days coming to heel under DW’s gentle guidance, he had wanted the privileges of TV ball games and assisting in the sanctuary. He then grew accustom to the peace and order that church life provided, and he found that he craved that peace as if it were water. Now he offered this to the boys in his care, and found that some of them would drink.

If there were nothing more to God than 'Good Orderly Direction' and the quiet mind it could provide, that was God enough.

=====

 

Naples, January 2061

“I even made popcorn, John.”

The tall priest took in the state of order and calm in the apartment.

“I am impressed by your hospitality, Emilio. It’s good to see you settled in here.”

“It is a gift to have some say over my own space, I must admit.”  Sandoz was thoughtful. “I can’t say that I have ever felt that way before. Isnt that odd?”

John Candotti didn’t think it odd in the least. The man before him had to rebuild his entire self after what he had lived through. And maintaining control over one’s own nest, not to mention hearing one’s self think, seemed the very definition of essential.

“I never lived that way, John. Certainly not growing up, not in La Perla, or even seminary. Well, you may have your own cell, but your time and your mind are not your own. You remember.” He smiled.

Candotti did remember, all too well, how difficult it had been for him to surrender to the monastic life. It made him nostalgic for his primary school, with all its noisy chaos, far away in cold Chicago.

“Well, on with the show!”

Emilio gave a turn as elegant as any matador and gestured with a flourish at the viewscreen with his gloved forearm.

The opening thunder of [_Young Frankenstein_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Frankenstein) flickered to life in all of its faux vintage glory.  The two men settled on the settee a comfortable distance apart, sharing the popcorn bowl.

“Tis a pity that kids today won’t realize what a spoof this was. To them the entire 20th century seems scratchy and monochrome.”

John nodded, mouth stuffed with salty corn. He swallowed.

“That’s true. I confess, the first time I saw it, it took me a while to double check the date.”

“Oh, come on! Look at Gene Wilder’s hair! And the glasses. It <i>reeks</i> of the 1970s.”

“Come on, yourself. I wasn’t even born until 2005.”

They sniggered through Wilder’s classroom demonstration, anticipating the jokes.

“Poor Mr. Hilltop.”

Candotti admired Emilio’s dexterity with the popcorn, but knew better than to praise him for it. The man was showing off, pinching each delicate kernel and smacking his lips in satisfaction. He quipped a line of dialog just a half beat before the film:

“I am a scientist, not a philosopher! You have more chance of reanimating this scalpel than you have of mending a broken nervous system!”

Then they tensed, waiting for the scalpel gag, and laughed like young loons when it came, bent over and convulsing, until John recovered his breath and realized that Sandoz was crying.

With great gentleness he laid his hand softly onto Sandoz’ knee, and held the silence.

“The last time I watched this, it was on the Stella Maris, outbound. With Jimmy, and George, and…” he paused to still his quavering voice. Then he whispered:

“All of them. Gone.” Sandoz stared past the viewscreen, looking into his memory. The sun had lowered and come about to streak through the kitchen window, slicing a dagger of gold light across the floor, illuminating Emilio’s face.  A face lifted up to the world, noted Candotti, not crumpled in agony as John had seen him so many times before.

At some point John had gently taken the remote from Emilio’s hands and stopped the film. The afternoon quiet was only mussed by the rustle of the breeze through the window. Time felt stilled, like the dust motes hanging in the beam of late day sun, suspended. After several significant breaths, John took a risk.

“You were blessed to have known them, Emilio. I wish I could have spent just a day with any one of them, and you knew them all, and loved them so well.” He waited for the explosion, or collapse.

Instead the former priest turned toward him slowly, eyes glittering.

“Pardon me, boy, is this the Transylvania Station?”

“Ja, ja, track 29! Oh, can I give you a shine?”

John resumed the film, then abruptly grabbed the bowl.

“Don’t monopolize the popcorn!”

Emilio stuck out his tongue, and they laughed.

 _There is a God,_ John thought so fervently he hoped he had not spoken aloud. _For this man to have healed thus, there must be._

=====

 

 

June 2042, earth-relative

As Sofia sat by the river and waited, she remembered their early days, watching Emilio in the red-light, one child on his lap and another dozen gathered round, completely engaged. No, with Emilio it was more that that: he was at one with the moment. He offered his whole self to the children and they were drawn to his warm attention like honeybees to the blossom. Sofia felt she was watching something too intimate, but she could not have looked away.

When people spoke of his saintliness, Sofia knew it was simply this: Emilio’s whole hearted emersion in the life of a moment. He held nothing back. He had no wisp of attention to notice her watching him, to look up and contact her eyes, to acknowledge her appreciation.

Sofia had long known better than to long for anyone’s attention, but this was the moment when she fell, when she became, in Emilio’s language, a sinner, falling short of God’s expectation.

She could no longer detach and analyze — the tools that had served her so many years. And so Sofia tried to do what he would do: let herself fall, and feel the warmth of the moment melt her heart.

She closed her eyes, remembering that beautiful, innocent time, waiting for her child to come.

=====

 

 

Aboard the Giordano Bruno, 2069 earth-relative

Sandoz dreamed. No longer just the brutal nightmares that replayed his abuse and torment, he now also dreamt of strange mash-ups of the many worlds he had known: like the jumble of languages that his brain would assemble when exhausted, the images of hungry human children in Sudan, tended lovingly by Runa, who, when they looked up, had the faces of lost friends. Sofia appeared and spoke to him in K’San, her bearing like a queen. He reached out to her and she melted backwards into darkness, but offered her hand.

Breathing, Emilio waited in the twilight of his cabin for his heart to calm. The hum of the ship systems, the pounding of blood in his neck and arms echoed a chant already on his lips, something from seminary or a Mass so many years and worlds ago he could not find its name, only the simple drone of syllables and notes repeated in devotion:

_Personent hodie, voces puerulae, laudantes iucunde…_

Of course. It was from the [Feast of the Holy Innocents](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personent_hodie). Emilio recalled ’Ill son, less and sawn’ in Robichaux’s  lyrical accent. With the chant, and the memory of despair and bewilderment blended with the beauty of the chant honoring the beloved innocents, and the memory of love he had known for his La Perla boys, for Askama, for Celestina.

But despite the old tracks of tears for those lost, the image of Sofia, the regal young vulture, the indefatigable colleague, and the queen from his dream rose into his mind and somehow brought with it a nearly narcotic sensation of peace, of ‘all is well.’

As Emilio returned to his bed, he had the fleeting thought that he was no doubt deluded by madness. _So be it,_ he thought. For this moment he would choose the hope offered by this vision over the emptiness of a rational explanation.

“Salve, Regina” he whispered, as he drifted back to sleep.

 

  
=== _fin_ ===


End file.
